ashamed
Americanadjective
-
feeling shame; distressed or embarrassed by feelings of guilt, foolishness, or disgrace.
He felt ashamed for having spoken so cruelly.
- Antonyms:
- proud
-
unwilling or restrained because of fear of shame, ridicule, or disapproval.
They were ashamed to show their work.
- Antonyms:
- proud
-
Chiefly Midland U.S. (especially of children) bashful; timid.
adjective
-
overcome with shame, guilt, or remorse
-
(foll by of) suffering from feelings of inferiority or shame in relation to (a person, thing, or deed)
-
(foll by to) unwilling through fear of humiliation, shame, etc
Synonym Usage
Ashamed, humiliated, mortified refer to a condition or feeling of discomfort or embarrassment. Ashamed focuses on the sense of one's own responsibility for an act, whether it is foolish, improper, or immoral: He was ashamed of his dishonesty. She was ashamed of her mistake. Humiliated stresses a feeling of being humbled or disgraced, without any necessary implication of guilt: He was humiliated by the king. Both words are used equally in situations in which one is felt to be responsible for the actions of another: Robert felt humiliated by his daughter's behavior. Mom was ashamed of the way I looked. Mortified represents an intensification of the feelings implied by the other two words: She was mortified by her clumsiness.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Etymology
Origin of ashamed
First recorded before 1000; originally past participle of earlier ashame (verb) “to be ashamed,” Middle English, Old English āscamian, equivalent to ā- a prefix + scamian “to shame”; see origin at a- 3, shame
Explanation
When you have done something you know you shouldn't have, or just something embarrassing, you feel ashamed, or remorseful. Don't be ashamed of your unusual dance moves — you were the life of the party! The word ashamed has, in some form, been around since before the 11th Century. You might feel less ashamed of your mistakes if you're able to learn from them. As Jonathan Swift put it, "A man should never be ashamed to own that he has been in the wrong, which is but saying... that he is wiser today than yesterday."
Vocabulary lists containing ashamed
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
It’s not that I’m ashamed of my tastes.
From Slate • Jun. 14, 2026
In retrospect, I’m sorry and ashamed that I never spoke with Charles R. I also never saw anyone else do so.
From The Wall Street Journal • Jun. 10, 2026
Hollywood legend Richard Gere on Thursday said he was "ashamed" of the way the United States is handling migration as he launched an initiative to change attitudes to the topic in Berlin.
From Barron's • Jun. 4, 2026
A legal statement which UK Athletics produced years after the incident was described by the prosecutor as '"a deeply unworthy document by a national sporting body and one of which it should be ashamed".
From BBC • Jun. 1, 2026
He sounded like he didn’t want to be left alone, but he was too ashamed to say so.
From "Found" by Margaret Peterson Haddix
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
